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By Isabel KershnerTHE NEW YORK TIMES • Saturday January 12, 2013 6:51 AM

JERUSALEM — Adopting a tactic more commonly employed by Jewish settlers who establish wildcat
outposts in the West Bank, scores of Palestinian activists and international supporters erected
tents yesterday in a contested piece of Israeli-occupied West Bank territory known as E1, and they
intended to stay put.

The Palestinians claim E1, just east of Jerusalem, as part of a future state. The protest comes
six weeks after Israel said it was moving forward with plans for thousands of new homes in E1,
stirring international anger.

Israeli military authorities arrived yesterday and handed the protesters notices warning them
that they were trespassing and must leave, according to police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld. Rosenfeld
said he expected some movement “at some point,” with the protesters either leaving voluntarily or
being removed.

But the protesters said their lawyers already have gone to court in Israel to fight any
evacuation until the state details the grounds for such a move. Protest leaders said the court had
given the state six days to respond.

Israeli plans to build in E1 have been strongly opposed for years by international players,
including the United States, which say construction there would partially separate the northern and
southern West Bank, further fragmenting any future Palestinian state.Israel announced its intention
as a countermeasure after the U.N. General Assembly voted in November to upgrade the Palestinians’
status to that of a nonmember observer state.